A Mobile Health Intervention Among Hispanics

December 12, 2025 updated by: Zhaomeng Niu, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

Developing and Testing a Mobile Health Intervention to Promote Sun Protection Behaviors and Skin Examination Among Hispanics

Hypothesis: More than 80% of the participants (n=40) will complete the intervention at three month (intervention completion) and the six month follow-up (retention rate as feasibility). More than 70% of the participants will report high overall study satisfaction (acceptability) with the intervention and study.

This pre-pilot will inform intervention and procedural refinements for the pilot.

Hypothesis: Participants who receive the intervention (n=57) will report more skin cancer-related preventive behaviors (e.g., mean of summed score of sun protection behaviors such as use of sunscreen, etc.) at three month and six month follow-up compared to those in the control condition (n=57, who will receive general information about physical activity and nutrition).

Study Overview

Status

Recruiting

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

Aim 1: The investigator will conduct individual interviews among key stakeholders such as health care providers and community leaders to plan a mobile skin cancer intervention among Hispanics. Data will be collected from individual interviews (n=10-12) among key stakeholders and triangulated with data from a funded pilot grant (focus groups and surveys with Hispanic community members) to gather information regarding Hispanics perceptions and behaviors related to skin cancer and suggestions for a WhatsApp intervention.

Aim 2: Employing a user-centered approach to develop a WhatsApp intervention to promote skin cancer risk-reduction behaviors among Hispanics and encourage engagement in the intervention. Use an iterative qualitative (focus groups with Hispanics, n=32; individual interviews with key stakeholders e.g., health care providers and community leaders, n=10-12) process to incorporate input from Hispanics and relevant stakeholders to develop a mobile WhatsApp intervention that is theory- and culturally-guided.

Aim 3: The investigators will evaluate the feasibility and acceptability of this mobile intervention in a single-arm pre-, post-test pilot study among at-risk Hispanics.

Aim 4: Refine the intervention and conduct a pilot RCT (n = 114) using this mobile program among Hispanics at risk for skin cancer and assess the preliminary effects of the mobile intervention at 3-month (intervention completion) and 6-month follow-ups.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Estimated)

114

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Contact

Study Locations

  • United States
    • New Jersey
      • New Brunswick, New Jersey, United States, 08901
        • Recruiting
        • Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey
        • Contact:

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

18 years to 100 years (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Self-report as Hispanics
  • 18 years or older
  • No personal history of skin cancer
  • Report more than one skin cancer risk factor
  • Do not engage in sufficient sun protection behaviors
  • Have not conducted a SSE in the past three months
  • Own a smartphone and will be willing to use WhatsApp

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Currently being treated for melanoma or nonmelanoma skin cancer

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Prevention
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Mobile skin cancer intervention
Conduct a pilot of the refined intervention among Hispanics to evaluate the preliminary efficacy of the user-centered mobile skin cancer intervention program.
Behavioral: Hispanics Skin Cancer intervention
With the insights from the community, the investigators will then develop the mobile intervention targeting Hispanics at risk for skin cancer to promote sun protection and SSE and get feedback to optimize the intervention. After the random allocation participants will receive instructions on how to use WhatsApp and then the intervention. They will receive WhatsApp messages about skin cancer for three months with optimal frequencies determined by prior aims and complete a post-intervention survey which contains the same questions in the pre-survey. The pilot RCT will be conducted around the spring/summer of Year four of the R00 when UVR is generally the highest in the US. The participants will be contacted at six months after the baseline survey to complete another survey similar to the post-intervention survey.
Active Comparator: Control group: physical activity and nutrition information
Participants will complete a baseline survey first; and then they will be randomly assigned into either the intervention group or the control group. After the random allocation participants will receive instructions on how to use WhatsApp and then the intervention. The participants will receive WhatsApp messages about skin cancer for three months with optimal frequencies determined by prior aims and complete a post-intervention survey which contains the same questions in the pre-survey. The participants will be contacted at six months after the baseline survey to complete another survey similar to the post-intervention survey.
Behavioral: Control group: physical activity and nutrition for Hispanics
Content will be developed from established websites such as CDC's Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity. We selected these topics because they are also of concern among Hispanics and provide an unrelated attention control.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Sun protection behavior by self-report
Time Frame: The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Mean score of use sunscreen with an SPF 30 or higher, seek shade, wear protective clothing, wear wide-brimmed hat, wear sunglasses
The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Seek shade behavior by self-report
Time Frame: The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Seek shaded areas
The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Wear protective clothing behavior by self-report
Time Frame: The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Wear protective clothing
The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Wear wide-brimmed hat behavior by self-report
Time Frame: The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Waer a wide brim hat
The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Wear sunglasses behavior by self-report
Time Frame: The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Wear sunglasses
The change is being assessed at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Skin self-examination
Time Frame: Changes at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Skin examination by oneself
Changes at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
Skin examination by a health care professional
Time Frame: Changes at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals
skin examination by a health care professional
Changes at baseline, three month and six month follow-up intervals

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Zhaomeng Niu, PhD, Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

April 20, 2025

Primary Completion (Estimated)

October 31, 2026

Study Completion (Estimated)

October 31, 2026

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

May 17, 2022

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

May 20, 2022

First Posted (Actual)

May 25, 2022

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimated)

December 16, 2025

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

December 12, 2025

Last Verified

December 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • 132206
  • Pro2022000533 (Other Identifier: Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

Clinical Trials on Cancer of Skin

Clinical Trials on Hispanics Skin Cancer intervention

Search Similar Trials

Sponsors and Collaborators

Medical Conditions

Drug Interventions

CROs by country

CROs in Saint Lucia

Conditions

Rare Diseases

Drug Interventions

Dietary Supplements

Sponsor/Collaborators

Locations

Subscribe